


Katalyst

by moonpalace (marawrder)



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Joseph Kavinsky Lives, M/M, Minor Joseph Kavinsky/Prokopenko, One-Sided Joseph Kavinsky/Ronan Lynch, good thing burning stuff is k's specialty, slow burn fast burn idc it just has to burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-05
Packaged: 2020-10-10 03:54:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20521523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marawrder/pseuds/moonpalace
Summary: If Kavinsky had ever had any other purpose than to make Ronan's life a living nightmare, his Fourth of July party burnt it away. He may have survived, but nothing is like it was before, and Ronan has vowed to stay away from him – something that Kavinsky won't let happen. He is still in Ronan's head, which is where he stumbles across his other secrets, and oh boy does he plan to have fun with it. When Ronan realizes that Kavinsky has grown from a nuisance into a real danger, it is almost too late. Will he act as a catalyst to the story of  Ronan and Adam's luck or of their demise? Spoiler: That is a question they disagree on.





	1. Cover

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first full fic I'm actually taking serious, so please be patient with me. I'm posting the cover art I made for Wattpad first:


	2. Some People Are like the Literal Plague - Actually, No, It's Just One Person

The fists to which Ronan Lynch's hands were clenched did little to conceal the tremor in them, in his arms, his legs, his heart. It was not from exhaustion, although heaving a dead body of quite literally one's own weight outside a church and into one's car was indeed rather exhausting. It was not from anger, either, although it made him angry, and he had punched the steering wheel of his dangerously grey BMW quite a few times before slumping down in the seat. And it was not from fear, because there had been infinitely more terrible things he had dreamt to life, unconsciously or consciously, things that had made him vow not to ever sleep again. It was quite possibly a mix of all of those things. Or maybe watching another person die in front of you, watching someone you had killed die in front of you, watching yourself, whom you had killed, die in front of you, watching a person you'd sworn would never have to see that side of you watch you watching yourself, whom you had killed, die in front of you, was just a generally unsettling thing. Maybe it was Adam's expression that had shaken him so deep down that it still now resonated in his extremities or his words that seemed to imply what they always did when they fought. But it was no news that Adam Parrish stirred earthquakes within him.

It felt as if he'd only had half a second to breathe when what was probably one of the worst nights in Ronan's life turned into, well, the culmination of what he could only imagine was the worst night in the entire history of the universe. Headlights blinded him for a moment, and then he could make out a ghostly white car with black grilles like a gaping hole. It was a car that Ronan could pick out among a thousand other cars within a second, and not in a good way. When Joseph Kavinsky, exactly the sort of monstrosity that you would expect driving such a car, pulled up next to him, Ronan's anger boiled into exasperation. Kavinsky was like a parasite, you could ignore him all you wanted and he still wouldn't back off. There was nothing that would _make_ him back off, except maybe death, and Kavinsky, like many pests, didn't die easily - a discovery that Ronan had made this summer and that he found infinitely enraging. On the Fourth of July, there had been a moment where, finally, it had seemed like Kavinsky would get what had been coming for him, and for that split second, Ronan had been afraid for him. But what had happened was worse. He had seen the events unfold before him like a nightmare, only that with a nightmare he knew that there was a chance it would stay in his head. This had been real, and he'd had no control over it. _The world's a nightmare_. Whatever fire and wrath Kavinsky had dreamed up, he seemed immune to it, and when he had emerged unscathed from the flames, all the wide feelings of horror, consternation, awe, had shriveled up into something equally as heavy but compressed to the size of Ronan's ribcage: disgust, rage, hatred. He would have taken him down himself if he could, but he couldn't, so he'd just held Matthew and watched as Kavinsky slid from his Mitsubishi like this was a playground and not a battlefield, while the albino night terror tore out the dragon's throat in the background.

Ronan would have loved to tear out Kavinsky's throat right now, as he rolled up next to him and lazily leaned out the open window, but showing him this anger was only like throwing gas at an open fire. Instead, he kept his gaze fixed straight ahead on an undefined point in the distance and the windows of his car closed. Through the glass, he heard the muffled sound of Kavinsky hollering at him, but he let the sound drip off him like rain off a fast car. Only when K started honking like a maniac, like he owned the city and like it wasn't the middle of the night, when people usually slept, Ronan rolled down the window on the passenger side. Out of having to talk to Kavinsky and not talking to him but having Adam look outside, see the two of them and potentially assume they were talking, he knew which one he preferred. He didn't say a word as he glared at the other driver. Only Kavinsky would honk his car in front of a church in the middle of the night like he was trying to wake the dead. God, Ronan hoped that the dead stayed dead.

"Ey, I'm talking to you!", K hollered, but his face betrayed no indignation. Instead, his thin grin was all smugness, like anything Ronan was doing played perfectly into his sick game.

They were in the same proximity to each other as they would have been at a street light, feeling the tension surge as they anticipated the green signal, the acceleration and the adrenaline of the race. Ronan felt a pricking in the tips of his fingers like they would much rather be curled around the steering wheel than around themselves, but when he clenched his fists tighter it was gone. He had left the races behind. He had left Kavinsky behind, although he didn't seem to have gotten the memo.

"What's the matter, Lynch? You look like someone just died." K didn't know, he couldn't know, but he sneered like he was congratulating himself. Ronan stayed silent, not even giving in to a flinch, this wasn't worse than K's satisfaction at any other reaction than the stern look that was stitched onto his face, holding his features together.

"Lighten up a little!"

It could just be Ronan, maybe his hearing was now finetuned to what Kavinsky was saying, as if the explosions of the Fourth had cleared a pressure that had been blocking his ears, but there seemed to be an aggressive double meaning to Kavinsky's words that dug deep into Ronan's patience. Kavinsky wanted to see the whole world light up a little, he wanted to see it light up in flames.

There were times before when Ronan thought that he shared that vision. Most people in the world led perfectly rounded and smooth lives, ones in which they fit comfortably and well; he had always felt too jagged and spiky to adjust to the round world, and he'd seen the same in Kavinsky. He'd seen it in Gansey, in Adam, in Blue, even in Noah, but none of them protruded as sharply as he felt he must. They were all different, non-rounded shapes, stretching and adjusting their life to fit them, and not the other way around, with varying degrees of struggle. But he and Kavinsky were shaped like weapons, blades that cut what was around them and themselves any time they moved. At least Ronan thought they were the same, but recently his insides rebelled so strongly against the idea that he'd started to accept that they might not be after all.

At first, he had thought that he'd scared him off after the Fourth. Kavinsky had left them alone, he had left Cabeswater alone, and summer had peaked and gone by without another incident. He was never completely gone, Ronan was certain that if someone with Kavinsky's field of gravity was suddenly wiped off the face of the earth, you would be able to feel it. Kavinsky stayed to himself, but he always lurked around, at the periphery of the Henrietta life. Somehow, he had managed to lose his posse, only Prokopenko was left, and without the crew of rowdy rich boys to mask it, their otherness stuck out even more prominently than before — although Ronan wasn't sure if anyone else had noticed how much. Word in school was that he had given in to his pill problem, like mother like son, a reasonable explanation for a world in which magic didn't exist. He seemed like a shell of who he had once been, and there was nothing that Ronan owed to him anymore. Before, the things that had appalled him were what had drawn him in, now, he was just appalled. Before, Kavinsky had been like a car crash, something you couldn't walk away from even though you wanted to, now, Ronan couldn't bear the thought of having him anywhere near his friends and his family. Before, he had thought Kavinsky was mad, just the right amount to make him reckless and raw, now, he had realized that he was properly, positively insane. 

It had taken Kavinsky a few weeks to notice that Ronan wasn't coming back on his own. It was like he had thrown his own principle overboard: _Either you're with me, or you're against me_. The whole world was against him, and he was against it, but Ronan was different, and he wanted him on his side no matter the price. When he realized that whatever lure he'd had before didn't work on him anymore, he had decided to take matters into his own hands, and since then, the harassment hadn't stopped. Whatever Ronan did, there was no escaping Kavinsky's comments, his glares, his presence. It was like he was obsessed.

The death stares Ronan was shooting at him didn't seem to bother K, at least they didn't deter him from continuing his games.

"What're you out here for, Lynch? Private little praying session? Meeting up with a lover?"

Ronan wasn't in the mood to dignify these meaningless taunts with a response, like, ever, but especially not tonight. If he could just block out his words, the other would grow bored and drive away, but he had learned to be careful. Even if the Kavinsky now seemed burnt out and harmless compared to the maniac that hadn't hesitated to hurt his family, Ronan knew that he would regret underestimating him again.

"Wait, this is where Parrish lives, right?" 

He'd been ready to let Kavinsky's words wash over him unbothered, but his head perked up at the sound of Adam's name. There was a certainty to Kavinsky's tone that frightened him, like he'd known for a while and just waited for this opportunity to reveal to him that he did. What did he want from Adam?

"Stay the fuck away, Kavinsky." 

He didn't say _from him_, but Kavinsky's smug grin grew satisfied as if he'd understood the meaning behind it. Or maybe he'd just waited for any reaction, wasn't that the reason why he always pestered him?

"Sure, whatever. Keep your boy toy to yourself, I don't care." 

His sharp laugh underlined how much he didn't care, and how much Ronan needed to keep an eye out for him from now on. It drove him insane, and if there was one lesson the last summer had taught him it was that insanity was the last thing he needed. Without another word, he hit the gas pedal. 


End file.
